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{
    "id": 27411,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/27411/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 247,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Mr. Wetangula",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": {
        "id": 210,
        "legal_name": "Moses Masika Wetangula",
        "slug": "moses-wetangula"
    },
    "content": "Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, with regard to Clause 8 of the Bill, there is a whole host of functions listed out for this Commission. However, when you read through you see that actually what we are creating is a toothless bull dog. It has got no capacity to do anything. It is just to investigate complain, report and so on. Where do we derive power for this Commission? I think my learned Senior Counsel should find the way of strengthening Clause 8, especially in the far flung areas, where people cannot afford to hire lawyers. Although the Constitution says we will help people access justice, there is no point of creating layer upon layer of dispute resolution and attention to people’s problems. If this Commission is to be really functional, effective and productive to the ordinary Kenyans, it must have the capacity to ensure justice is done to all. For example, if a rich man has encroached upon the land of a poor widow or deprived a poor person of his land, the Commission should be given authority to handle the matter to finality. They will recommend the matter, perhaps, to a District Commissioner or a Governor who is part of the same game and he will never solve the problem. So, they should be able to make a decision. I would want to see a Clause, where after the recommendation has been made by this Commission, it only moves to court for enforcement. The court to enforce this should not necessarily be the High court, but any court. We must make sure that even rural courts have the capacity to enforce decisions involving disputes arising from this. I say this because when we go to our rural courts, they are bedeviled with all manner of petty disputes; people quarrelling over chicken, goats, one cow and an inch of land. These are all things that we can offload from the mainstream courts and put them in what hon. M. Kilonzo is describing as alternative dispute resolution. But that alternative dispute resolution must have positive results in order to give people the confidence and desire to go to such places. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I can see that there is no provision for the Commission to recommend, although it is investigating unfair treatment, manifest injustice and unlawful oppression. You have not given them express authority to recommend prosecutions. They should also recommend prosecutions. For example, where an administrator colludes with other people to injure the rights of a citizen, sometimes that is not a civil matter. It is criminal in nature and when you have issues of a criminal nature, the Commission, although it cannot prosecute, should recommend prosecution and hand over its recommendations to the Director of Public Prosecutions, who then will decide what to do with the recommendations. I also join my colleagues who have talked about diversity. We want to see this Commission with clear diversity of all Kenyans. In my humble view, I would wish to see the head of the Commission, to give it the seriousness and the import it deserves, to be a person qualified to sit in the Court of Appeal or the Supreme Court of Kenya, so that it carries that weight. When you just say anybody with a degree, that is not good enough. I would like to see a person fit enough to sit in the Supreme Court like my learned friend, hon. Orengo or myself, being responsible for this Commission. I have not seen and I hope it has not been left out, that the Commission must make periodic reports to Parliament, so that Parliament can scrutinize what they do, see their levels of implementation and assist them in achieving what we are asking them to do. Finally, I want to urge that we all support this Bill because it is a good Bill."
}